Transit industry vehicles (TIV) typically have many systems running thereon, such as engines, breaks, audio announcement technology, signage, and the like. Many TIVs have monitors that keep track of, and set, the status of such systems. A familiar technology solution is to have various inputs and outputs from the systems provided to a vehicle logic unit (VLU), such VLU remains on the vehicle in normal operation. Operators of the TIV often then interact with the VLU (and its data) via a mobile data terminal (MDT).
MDTs are continuously evolving and are varied, across hardware manufacturers and the transit agencies that purchase and deploy those MDTs in their fleets. As with other, general purpose, computing devices, the trend is for MDTs to become smaller, more powerful and flexible, and to communicate in many different ways.
VLUs, although typically less dynamic than MDTs, are also continuously evolving and frequently interact with newer systems, more systems, and different inputs/outputs for those systems.
While VLUs typically reside and remain on vehicles until they are replaced, it may be desirable for MDTs to be removed from the TIV, for example by the operator, and employed on another TIV at a later time. Each VLU may thus interact with multiple MDTs, and the reverse.
Unfortunately, the applications running on these varied and evolving MDTs and VLUs have historically needed to be continuously changed—both to operate on the devices, to communicate with each other, and to communicate with the systems on a TIV. This is undesirable, time-consuming, and expensive.
There thus remains a need for hardware-agnostic mobile data terminal communication.